The Elderbeast had his friend over for a sleepover today. His friend, I have to say, is exceptionally well behaved–polite, clean, tidy: all the things you want of a house-guest.

However, when the two of them get together, the noise levels inevitably ramp up. Most people reading this will know I have a particular sensitivity to noise–and if you didn’t; you do now. Letting the Kinderbesten have friends over is a double dilemma. On the one hand, I want them to socialise and have friends, and do all the normal things. On the other hand, the resulting noise causes me such stress that I usually have to go and hide, and leave them to it.

Maybe that’s just a regular dilemma. I don’t know. Give me this over-dramatisation, will ya?

So, for this evening I let the Elderbeast and his friend play Cuphead on my PC, while I hid in the front room. I literally shut both doors and picked out a film that would hopefully provide a reasonable distraction (Tucker & Dale vs. Evil, if you were wondering). For the most part it worked: the beasts had a good time, and I enjoyed a relatively chilled out film night.

Maybe one day I’ll learn some better strategies for coping with the noise and these evenings can be a bit more of a family thing. For now, however, I’d rather take myself out of the equation than have to keep barking at them to be a bit quieter.

Yep, yep, yep. I know …